One simple suggestion, completely dependent on a bajillion factors I realize, is that if you have two solid stamina trinkets to go ahead and go 20 par/20 mas, otherwise 20 mas/30 sta might be warranted depending on your gear level.

The premise being, if you've got two stamina trinkets equipped, there shouldn't be as much need to gem for it, even with the weaker trinkets.

The inverse would apply with two mastery trinkets as well.

Last edited by inthedrops on Fri Jan 07, 2011 11:41 am, edited 1 time in total.

Digren wrote:Likewise, after the discussion here I have slightly devalued stamina in comparison to mastery. Thus, effective immediately I will also recommend mastery/stamina gems in all blue, yellow, and prismatic sockets, except for JCers who can use a mix of their special stamina and mastery gems. (I recommend two mastery and one stamina of those gems.) Sure pure mastery in yellow and pure stamina in blue have the exact same effect, but it's easier to just buy or hire a JCer to cut a bunch of one gem, then use it most everywhere.

Seems mostly sound. However, given input from people, who, in difference from me, have valid information from raids, we should probably try to find the health-bar needed. Pushing for it and after that going for full avoidance/mastery is likely to be more efficient than slamming a stam/mastery gem into every available slot with no concern taken to the tank's actual health.

I have to give credit to Blizzard. They took away a bunch of stats and simplified gear design and yet made gear choice a lot more complicated in Cata. The ability to reforge alone means every piece is as many as three or four pieces based on the different viable reforge options. Throw in different viable gem options thanks to usable socket bonuses and more than one stat to stack and evaluating any one piece of gear can require looking at it ten different ways to see how it works best.

yappo wrote:Seems mostly sound. However, given input from people, who, in difference from me, have valid information from raids, we should probably try to find the health-bar needed. Pushing for it and after that going for full avoidance/mastery is likely to be more efficient than slamming a stam/mastery gem into every available slot with no concern taken to the tank's actual health.

In the gear guide I want to recommend a baseline stamina for each tier. So far I have 115k for a stage one tank, 130k for a stage two tank, and 150k for a stage three tank. If my gem recommendations make it difficult to reach those baselines, then yeah, I agree I'll have to adjust the recommendations.

It's difficult to play with that without a working character profiler. Wowhead's still isn't there yet.

yappo wrote:Seems mostly sound. However, given input from people, who, in difference from me, have valid information from raids, we should probably try to find the health-bar needed. Pushing for it and after that going for full avoidance/mastery is likely to be more efficient than slamming a stam/mastery gem into every available slot with no concern taken to the tank's actual health.

In the gear guide I want to recommend a baseline stamina for each tier. So far I have 115k for a stage one tank, 130k for a stage two tank, and 150k for a stage three tank. If my gem recommendations make it difficult to reach those baselines, then yeah, I agree I'll have to adjust the recommendations.

It's difficult to play with that without a working character profiler. Wowhead's still isn't there yet.

Digren wrote:In the gear guide I want to recommend a baseline stamina for each tier. So far I have 115k for a stage one tank, 130k for a stage two tank, and 150k for a stage three tank. If my gem recommendations make it difficult to reach those baselines, then yeah, I agree I'll have to adjust the recommendations.

If the goal is 150k, I suspect you will have to recommend gemming for stamina in blue and prismatic. I am a level 3 tank and think I have about the best gear I can get from your gear list for that level. I've got all my JP, crafted and reputation gear, with heroic drops in other slots iirc. Gemming for mainly for mixed mastery/stamina, but with 3 pure mastery gems, I am only at 141k unbuffed, 145k with kings. I don't have a stamina trinket, but they seem thin on the ground (if you are not a JC) and I am benefiting from the mining stamina buff.

However, I don't think a guide should recommend gemming for 150k unless there is convincing evidence that this is indeed the health that an entry level raider needs. As Wittgenstein said, what we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence.

150k unbuffed is a pretty reasonable target for entry-level raiding. I'm not sure what you would constitute as evidence in this case though, damage intake is a lot more flexible now. Certainly you can kill bosses with 140k health or less, but it seems like 150k-160k is about the point where healers can relax a little. That's not going to be easily quantifiable though, and likely depends on your healers as much as it does on your health.

Haven't read everything so I do apologize it this has been mentioned. But you don't chose between stamina and mitigaiton/avoidance on just about anything but trinkets. Ofc there are some minor choice on gems/enchants, in wich case oppertunity cost is very interesting, but their total outcome won't make a very big difference. Then there is reforging ofc, wich can be very significant if you don't have mastery on a piece, but as you gather epic gear with mastery on it, it becomes less of a big deal.

For the moment I'm just trying to get the best survival pieces, and augment them for balance. Swap trinkets based on the fight. And that's the thing, I don't think we can define the real value of EH without looking at a specific fight, and your current gearlevel. So basicly, if you're lacking that 150K, get some stamina, otherwise get some mitigation/avoidance. But if there is a magic fight or a fight where you get big spikes, don't be afraid to bust out those stamina trinkets ( specially the ones with procs on low health )

So basicly for the moment what would be very interesting to know about the relationships between stats is how to make the choices on gems/enchants/reforging on best oppertunity cost. For that some numbers on stam/mastery/parry+dodge would be very interesting indeed. At least untill we get the luxury to make multiple specialised sets

Awyndel wrote:So basicly for the moment what would be very interesting to know about the relationships between stats is how to make the choices on gems/enchants/reforging on best oppertunity cost. For that some numbers on stam/mastery/parry+dodge would be very interesting indeed. At least untill we get the luxury to make multiple specialised sets

Considering the rather large shifts into a chosen direction you can make with reforging, and to a certain extent with gemming, those specialized sets are perfectly doable with copies. Two copies of the same chestplate becomes two distinctly different pieces of gear dependent on gemming and reforging. This is very different from ICC where stamina was the correct gem, we had no reforging, and thus HAD to get a different drop in order to see a different result.

Awyndel wrote:But you don't chose between stamina and mitigaiton/avoidance on just about anything but trinkets. Ofc there are some minor choice on gems/enchants, in wich case oppertunity cost is very interesting, but their total outcome won't make a very big difference.

Don't discount the swing that gems can provide. Sure, it used to not be very much when you were talking about pure stamina in half your slots, and then sta/something in the other half, but now we're talking about pure mastery in yellow gem slots, mastery/sta in blue, and parry/mastery in red. Contrast that with pure stamina in blue, mastery/sta in yellow, and parry/sta in red, and you could swing, say, 270 stamina with ease. That's about 5k health. With trinkets being maybe 10k swing (each), your gemming strategy is about 20% of your overall decision. Moreover, you don't really have to decide on your trinkets; you can switch them from encounter to encounter. However for most folks their gemming decisions are pretty well fixed unless they take the time to gather a second set of gear, so more thought is warranted for making it optimal for the largest variety of encounters.

Finally, there's a choice between stamina and mitigation/avoidance whenever you choose to use a lower iLvl piece over a piece with a higher iLvl. This isn't as rare as you'd think because mastery rating is just so good, and some pieces aren't itemized well for it.

Digren wrote:Finally, there's a choice between stamina and mitigation/avoidance whenever you choose to use a lower iLvl piece over a piece with a higher iLvl. This isn't as rare as you'd think because mastery rating is just so good, and some pieces aren't itemized well for it.